1. Technical Field
This invention relates to thin film metal alloy magnetic recording disks for horizontal recording, and in particular to a CoPt alloy disk having low intrinsic media noise at high linear recording density.
2. Description of the Prior Art
One of the problems with thin film metal alloy media, including CoPt media, is that the intrinsic media noise increases with increasing linear recording density. Media noise arises from irregularities in the magnetic transitions and results in random shifts of the readback signal peaks. These random shifts are referred to as "peak jitter" or "time jitter". Thus, the higher the media noise, the higher the bit error rate. It is therefore desirable to develop a thin film metal alloy media which generates noise below a maximum acceptable level in order that data can be recorded at maximum linear density. The effect of intrinsic media noise, as measured by peak jitter and media signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), on the bit error rate in magnetic recording systems is described by Katz, et al., in "Effect of Bitshift Distribution on Error Rate in Magnetic Recording", IEEE Trans. on Magnetics, Vol. MAG-15, pp. 1050-1053, 1979. The measurement of media SNR is described by Belk, et al., in "Measurement of the Intrinsic Signal-to-Noise Ratio for High Performance Rigid Recording Media", J. Appl. Physics, 59(2), Jan. 15, 1986, pp. 557-562.
Assignee's U.S. Pat. No. 4,789,598 describes a cobalt-platinum-chromium (CoPtCr) alloy magnetic recording disk wherein the high Cr concentration reduces the intrinsic media noise at high recording density.
Japanese Kokai 61-276116 describes a cobalt-nickel (CoNi) alloy disk with high SNR. The disk substrate is alumite-coated and the CoNi magnetic film is sputter deposited in the presence of either oxygen or nitrogen, after which the disk is heat treated, resulting in a disk with 20 to 50 atomic percent oxygen or nitrogen present in the CoNi magnetic film.
Three additional references describe various cobalt alloy thin film disks which appear to have either oxygen or nitrogen incorporated into the magnetic films in various amounts, but without any teaching of deliberately introducing oxygen during sputtering for the purpose of improving the SNR of the magnetic films. For example, Japanese Kokai 61-142523 describes a CoPt disk wherein the magnetic film is sputtered in the presence of nitrogen and then heat treated to crystallize the film and drive off the nitrogen, resulting in a CoPt film containing 0.5 to 5 atomic percent nitrogen. Japanese Kokai 61-253622 describes a CoCrX (X=Pt, Rh, Re, Pd, Ir, etc.) alloy disk wherein up to 5 atomic percent oxygen or nitrogen may be present in the magnetic film. U.S. Pat. No. 4,749,459 to Yamashita describes a CoPt disk which is formed by introducing very small amounts of nitrogen or an oxygen-containing gas during sputter deposition of the magnetic film, for the express purpose of reducing the coercivity of the resulting CoPt film.